When to order honeycomb paper wrap for 2027: an importer's calendar

In 2027, Diwali falls exactly four weeks before Black Friday. For anyone importing paper packaging from India for the Christmas peak, that one fact shapes the whole year.

Plan your 2027 orders around four sets of dates. First, India's festival weeks, when factories and trucks run short of hands: Holi on 22 or 23 March, Diwali week from 27 to 31 October, and Chhath on 4 November. Second, the monsoon, which matters for storage. Third, your own market's peaks: Easter at the end of March, Black Friday on 26 November and Christmas on a Saturday. Fourth, the replenishment time your supplier and forwarder confirm in writing. The container for your Christmas peak should be loaded before Diwali week starts, not after it.

Checked against official sources on 28 October 2026.

We make honeycomb paper wrap in Jaipur and load export containers at Mundra port in Gujarat. I will not print a lead time here. Production time depends on the paper market and our order book in the week you order, and a number on a web page would be wrong within a month. What I can give you is the calendar that every Indian supplier, ours included, works around.

The 2027 calendar at a glance

Indian dates come from Drikpanchang's 2027 calendar and the central government's 2027 holiday list (DoPT office memorandum of 16 July 2026). The US dates are from the Office of Personnel Management and the UK dates from GOV.UK bank holidays.

Which Indian holidays actually slow a shipment?

Not the one-day national holidays. A factory loses a day and gets on with it.

The ones that matter are the festivals when people travel home.

Diwali comes first by a long way. In 2027, Dhanteras is on Wednesday 27 October, Diwali on Friday 29 October and Bhai Dooj on Sunday 31 October. In Jaipur this is the biggest week of the year. Many workers go home to their families, and many from Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh stay on for Chhath on 4 November. Mundra is in Gujarat, where many businesses also close for some days after Diwali for the Gujarati New Year.

So the slowdown spreads well beyond the factory gate. Paper mills, truck fleets, packers and customs brokers all run thin in the same week.

Holi is shorter, but it moves. Drikpanchang puts Holi on Monday 22 March 2027, while the central government list has Tuesday 23 March. Local practice decides which day a plant closes, so I would plan for both days and a slow few days around them.

Eid dates depend on the moon and can shift by a day.

My advice is simple. Ask any Indian supplier, ours included, for its 2027 holiday list in writing. Ask your forwarder and the trucking company the same question.

The monsoon is a storage problem, not a shipping problem

In a normal year the monsoon reaches Rajasthan and Gujarat around late June or early July and withdraws in the second half of September, as per the India Meteorological Department's normal onset and withdrawal dates.

Paper takes up moisture from the air, and damp honeycomb paper opens badly and tears more. Our plant is moisture-controlled, rolls are wrapped as they come off the line, and pallets are stretch-wrapped. The weak points are the waits: a container standing in a yard, a pallet left at the door of a warehouse.

Ask your forwarder for a clean, dry container in these months, and check the floor before loading. At your end, unload on a dry day if you can and get the pallets inside. Our guide to storage and humidity explains what damp does to the paper and how to store it.

Your own peak dates in 2027

These are the dates your customers care about.

1. Valentine's Day is on Sunday 14 February.
2. Good Friday is on 26 March and Easter Monday on 29 March. Holi falls in the same week, so spring stock should leave India before it.
3. US Thanksgiving is on Thursday 25 November, so Black Friday is on 26 November and Cyber Monday on 29 November.
4. Christmas Day is a Saturday. The US federal holiday is observed on Friday 24 December, and England and Wales have substitute bank holidays on 27 and 28 December.

Working back from your peak: an example

Every number here is an assumption for the arithmetic. It is not a lead time from us or from anyone else.

Say a distributor in Europe wants its peak stock on the shelf by Monday 8 November 2027, about two and a half weeks before Black Friday. Its forwarder says that from the day a container is loaded at Mundra, it takes 6 weeks to reach the shelf, including sailing, customs and haulage.

1. 8 November minus 6 weeks is Monday 27 September. That is the latest loading date.
2. Before loading comes production and inland transport, which only the supplier can confirm. That decides the order date.
3. Navratri starts on 30 September and Dussehra is on 9 October. Neither stops a factory for long.
4. Diwali week starts on 27 October. If anything in the plan slips by a month, it runs straight into it.

That is why I would load the peak container before Diwali, and never plan to load during it.

The same sum works for any peak. Our guide on stock planning for imported honeycomb paper shows how to set a reorder point, and our post on container loading shows how many rolls fit.

A 2027 order plan, quarter by quarter

1. January to March. Order spring stock early enough to load before Holi. If it must be on your shelf before Good Friday on 26 March, it should not wait for a Holi-week loading.
2. April to June. The quiet window, and India's new financial year starts on 1 April. Order samples for new widths or colours and test them before the monsoon. If you want a festive colour for Christmas, our post on holiday packing with coloured honeycomb paper helps you decide which one.
3. July to September. Confirm the peak order. Watch storage, because the paper travels in the humid months.
4. October to December. Diwali week, then top-ups only. Christmas is a one-day holiday in India, so Indian factories mostly work through late December. In those weeks the hold-up is often at the buyer's end, an approval waiting for someone on leave.

What to do now, before 2027 starts

1. Ask your supplier for its 2027 holiday list in writing, with the Diwali and Holi closure days.
2. Ask your forwarder for the transit time from Mundra to your port, and how it changes in October and November.
3. Pull last year's weekly use by width and grade, and mark the weeks when it went up.
4. Put four dates in your calendar: Holi week, the date your peak order must be confirmed, the latest loading date, and 27 October.
5. Book dry warehouse space for the peak container now.
6. Order samples for anything new before Holi, not after.

One more reason to write it all down. Diwali moves with the moon, so last year's dates are never this year's. In 2026 it fell on 8 November. In 2027 it comes ten days earlier in the calendar, on 29 October.

Send us your monthly use by width and your port through our contact page. We will tell you, in writing, which 2027 weeks to avoid for loading, and our export page explains pallets and documents.